"Shiyakusho" drama: Episode three recap

 Air Dates: October 16th until December 19, 2019 on TV-Tokyo  Wednesday nights at 12:12 am

Also goes by the title of 'Death Office', subs were done by HPriest

Main Cast: Will be tweaking some of the details as we go on and learn more about the characters. Of these five only Michiru doesn't work at the Death Office or at least for now. The four that do have mysterious pasts where it appears they killed someone, were they sentenced to work at the Death Office as a punishment?

Masahiro Matsuoka as Shimura.... main leader of the Death Office who is very stoic person who only goes by the book and has a dark past which we'll be seeing in drips and drabs

Yuina Kuroshima as Michiru Miki.... newly deceased young woman who claims she was killed but can't prove it, for some reason the Death Office is letting her hang around

Sho Kiyahara as Hayashi.... clerk at the Death Office who is a minor celeb as he was executed back in 2007 for a murder

Marika Matsumoto as Nishikawa.... clerk in the suicide division at the office, she too was condemned to death but why is unknown for now

Denden as Ishima.... older clerk in the murder division who also was condemned to death for mudering his niece's boyfriend

Guest Stars for this episode:

Takahiro Miura as Masumi Sakaura.... recently murdered man who ran a small diner, his father had owned it and he too was murdered at the same diner

Chizuru Asano as Wakako Sakaura.... Masumi's pregnant wife

 The action takes place at the 'Death Office' where all of us go when we die(?), all of the 'customers' at the office have recently been killed. Customers is the term used for the deceased who are interviewed by the staff to determine their next stage of afterlife.... Heaven, Hell or Purgatory....

 An interesting bit of trivia involves the guest star Miura who is in the first screenshot. His mother is Momoe Yamaguchi who may be the most popular Idol of all time in Japan. She was just so massive during the 70's but retired from singing in 1978 but did star in some films for the next five years. She got married to Tomokazu Miura and the pair are still married to this day, he himself is a popular actor and is still very active after all these years.

 Been finding it works out better having the main story with the guest star to lead the post off with and then end up talking about Michiru and the rest of the Death Office staff. Each story revolves around a newly dead person, for this show it's s young man named Masumi who you can see above. At first he seemed like a real hooligan and had wanted to start fighting with anyone at the office as Masumi thought these unknown people wanted to harm him. Shimura has many dark secrets which are slowly being revealed but one talent he has is calming others down which he was able to do with Masumi but unfortunately had to tell the man he was dead.
 That didn't shake up Masumi too much as he was sort of expecting that disastrous news as his last recollection of living was being stabbed. Masumi told Shimura and the others to make matters worse the stabbing took place at the exact location his father had also been stabbed twelve years prior. That location was a diner and one that Masumi eventually took over after the death of his father. Masumi did come off as such a tough guy at first but deep down he's a softie who really cared about the diner, it's faithful customers but even more so for his pregnant wife Wakako.
 That bottom screenshot above shows the moment Masumi was stabbed, right where his father was twelve years ago and to top it off the killer was the same person that murdered Masumi's father! That man who killed both was named Harashima who had been sent to jail but let out after ten years. That man had worked at the diner when the father ran it but had been fired for stealing from the register, in a fit of rage Harashima killed the father. Was it revenge that he came back to kill the son? Masumi wondered and that could be the only possibility. Masumi had testified at Harashima's trial and he could think of no other reason why he would be so hell bent on murdering Masumi.

 The Death Office has some super duper computer system which must be set up with the outside world. They can find out events that took place involving a customer's life that even the newly dead person didn't know, for instance the staff were able to discover that it was Harashima who had stabbed Masumi. But as mentioned his appearance may have made him look like a tough guy but Masumi had such a huge heart and had been hoping for the best for Harashima when he was released from prison. He also had wanted to make so many more dishes for his customers who had stood by him for so many years and had supported him after his father's murder.
 More than anything else Masumi was naturally concerned about his wife and unborn child, he really loved his wife Wakako so much. Shimura can have some kind and useful words now and again, he assured Masumi that his family would be fine in the future. The diner's customers really liked Masumi immensely who would do anything he could to help others. Now that he was gone the customers wouldn't forget about the fine young man and would make sure his family was well cared for. That reasoning seemed to hit home for Masumi who has finally accepted his death, now what awaits is his destination and it was an easy choice for the staff. Masumi's application to spend his afterlife in Heaven was accepted and like the people before him that's where he headed. Through four shows all of the newly dead have gone to Heaven, will one ever be sent to Hell?
 Above is the older staff member Ishima who is the main interviewer for the Murder Division. He had been talking to Shimura about killing and it was revealed during that conversation that Ishima had killed his niece's boyfriend many years ago. The circumstances around the killing remained a secret but are sure to come out eventually and for so long Ishima has been wondering did he make the right decision? He did if the boyfriend was hurting or using his niece but the murder bought Ishima a death sentence which was the fate for all working at the Death Office.

 Though have been saving what's taken place for Michiru and others on the staff for the end one of them is usually in a scene with the newly dead person. The final five or so minutes were devoted to Michiru who has been hanging around the Death Office for some time now, one staff lady was getting a bit annoyed at her presence and asked Michiru when will you be leaving and where will you be headed? When she first arrived at the office Michiru claimed she had been murdered but had no wounds on her, nor could she remember the exact details of her death nor could their computer find any info on her death. The pressure from the woman Nishikawa became a bit too much for Michiru who finally gathered the staff around her and related the events of her final day on Earth.
 It had been her 20th birthday and Michiru's friends had celebrated with her at a beach. There was a young man named Toju who she really liked but so didn't Michiru's best friend Aya, Toju seemed to be much more interested in her than he did for Michiru. To drown her sorrows Michiru began imbibing bottles of wine as it was also her first day to drink legally. Her friend kept giving her bottles and before she knew it Michiru had passed out, when she awoke to her amazement she was at the Death Office. Michiru had been having a difficult time accepting the fact she may have died of alcohol poisoning and felt sure her friend Aya had put something in the bottles.
 That probably wasn't the case as Michiru was so ashamed to admit she may have died in such a lame way. Up to that point she hadn't done much in life such as ever having a boyfriend. The staff listened to the entire tale without interruption, they also didn't give any opinions on her death except that the cause definitely had to be an accidental one. That scene brought us to the end of the show and it was probably longer than the five minutes I mentioned. But even with revealing the details of her death Michiru still has to make a decision on her afterlife very quickly. The limit to apply for Heaven is just 49 days after death, she's approaching that date and what happens takes place in the next recap.

 You can see that comment above which was said during the final credits, some of that mystery gets explained in the next episode but not all of it. This is the end of a mini marathon and think having a trio of recaps in a row worked out better, am really hoping to have the second of them by next weekend and then will end off with four in a row. Do have a pair of Korean shows I want to get to, that will happen but before starting on them may watch another Japanese series from 2019 titled "Headhunter". It stars two of my fave actresses who seldom have posts here, it's only a five episode drama so think that may be up next but still have seven more recaps to go in this series.